Software Technology Parks of India (STPI) will set up 28 centres of excellence (CoE) in the country at a cost of Rs 400 crore to boost software exports, its Director General Omkar Rai said.
The CoEs would act as unique platforms to provide appropriate eco-systems and opportunities to budding talents and entrepreneurs for launching innovative ventures, Rai said.
The objective of creating the centres would be to transform India into a product nation from an IT services country.
The STPI has also chalked out strategies to raise the volume of exports by STP units from around Rs 4.16 lakh crore in 2018-19, by 12 to 14 per cent during the current fiscal, Rai told PTI during a visit to Odisha.
"Concrete steps have been taken to open the 28 CoEs in emerging technologies in different parts of the country in the next 18 months. Some of these centres are already in the process of being operational," he said.
Four of the centres would be established in Odisha.
Noting that more than Rs 400 crore will have to be injected to start these state-of-the-art centres, Rai said, it is a collaborative venture as investments for the projects will flow from the concerned state Governments, Union Electronics and IT Ministry, industries and STPI's own funds.
The STPI DG said, the CoEs are being set up in places such as Chennai, Bengaluru, Lucknow, Bhubaneswar, Patna, Mohali, Hyderabad and Gurgaon.
Over half-a-dozen such centres will be opened in the north-eastern region, he said.
While establishing these centres, the focus will be on emerging technologies like artificial intelligence (AI), medical electronics, legal technologies, Internet of Things (IoT), IoT in agriculture and automotive electronics, he said.
"The National Software Product Policy 2019 also seeks to capitalise on the strength of our IT sector in order to make the country a software product nation and STPI has been encouraging, promoting and boosting the export of software," he said.
The STPI chief, who met Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on Friday, said four of the proposed centres of excellence would be located in the state, which has tremendous potential for the growth of IT sector.
One of the four CoEs is coming up in ESDM space Electropreneur Park in Bhubaneswar.
Noting that the STPI has played a seminal role in India having earned a reputation as an information technology superpower, Rai said the country's IT services industry stands at 177 billion dollars at present and exports amount to 136 billion dollars.
Over 50 per cent of the software exports from the country, which was 4.16 lakh crore last fiscal, was contributed by STP units, he said and the aim is to increast it by 12-14 per cent during the current financial year.
Mentioning that the global software product industry stands at 511 billion dollars, he said India's share is only 8.1 billion dollars. The objective, he said, is to increase India's to 80-90 billion dollars by 2025 and the CoEs will play a major role in achieving the goal.
He said STPI has a presence in many major cities of Bangalore, Chennai, Hyderabad, Trivandrum, Kanpur, Kolkata, Bhubaneswar, Mumbai, Nagpur, Warangal, Kakinada, Lucknow, Pune, Surat, Tirupati, Vijayawada and Visakhapatnam.
Besides regulating the STP scheme, STPI centers also provide a variety of services including high-speed data communication, incubation facilities, consultancy, network monitoring, data centers and data hosting. It provides physical hosting for National Internet Exchange of India.
STPI envisaged under Digital India program launched the India BPO Promotion Scheme (IBPS). This scheme seeks to incentivize establishment of 48,300 seats in respect of BPO/ITES operations across India.
Rai said STPI has established a joint venture to set up an 'Electropreneur Park' with the India Electronics and Semiconductor Association (IESA) which is aimed at supporting 50 startups working on electronics product designing and development over next five years.
The initiative is a subset of the government's 'Make in India' mission, aligned with entrepreneurial and innovation focus, he said.
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